Did the Government Say that Demonetisation Affected Farmers? A Fact Check

Jansatta, which was previously exposed for spreading fake news that possibly caused caste animosity among the communities, today (November 21, 2018) published a news report quoting The Hindu newspaper. The News report claimed that the Ministry of Agriculture has admitted that the farmers were adversely affected by the demonetisation. Congress President Rahul Gandhi lapped it up and tweeted the fake news to spread it further.

Jansatta’s Claim

According to Jansatta, the report made the observation that the note ban rendered farmers helpless in purchasing the seeds. Though the government relaxed the norm saying that the seeds can be purchased with the old Rs 500 and Rs 1000 notes, it had not helped farmers in buying the seeds. Thus, the seeds remained unsold while the farmers suffered, all because of demonetization.

Here are the Facts:

An unambiguous order was passed to the state government seed boards and the related institutions who were involved in the seed sales, enabling them to have transaction through the banned Rs 500 and Rs 1000 notes.

The upward trend of seed sales during the year 2016-17 (demonetisation year) proves that there were no difficulties for farmers in purchasing the seeds. See the below table.

Table: Comparison of the quantity of seeds sold

Crop

Quantity of Seed Sold (In Lakh Quintals)

2015-16

2016-17

Wheat

95.83

124.87

All Crops

304.4

348.58

Excluding Cotton, Jute, Mesta, Potato and Fodders

Above table clearly suggests the following:

In the year 2016-17, quantity of wheat seeds sold is higher than the quantity of wheat seeds sold in the year 2015-16. Thus, the sale of wheat seeds is higher in the year in which demonetisation was announced.

Overall seed distribution in the year 2016-17 is also higher than the total quantity of seed distribution in 2015-16.

The Minister of Agriculture has posted the tweet that explains all of the above.

Thus, the fake news spread by Rahul Gandhi and the Congress eco-system bites the dust within few hours.

Read our previous stories on Demonitisation to know how it helped India in various ways.